Identity Crisis
by AshCarroll aka ShadowDiva
Summary: AU, set during 13.14, 'Murmurs of the Heart'. She tells herself she's only kissing him back because it's not really drinking if the alcohol is in someone else's mouth. [DubenkoAbby]
1. Chapter 1

_Rating: FRT (Fan Rated suitable for Teens and over)_

_Disclaimer: ER and its characters are the property of Michael Crichton, John Wells, Amblin Entertainment and Constant C Productions. No infringement intended, please don't sue, yadda yadda yadda._

_Content Warning: Character death, language, adult themes_

_Spoilers: Entire Ames arc of S13, so from 13.5 - 13.14_

_Unbeta-ed, so any and all mistakes are mine. Dubenko/Abby? WHAT?! I know, I know. But you can blame __**dubenkojunkie**__ for this one. :P Remember that idea from the other night? Um, yeah. Happy early/late whatever. :D_

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**Identity Crisis**

**© 2007, By: Ash Carroll (a.k.a. ShadowDiva)**

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She hears the shot and watches him fall in slow motion. The sidewalk greets him with open arms, and her life shatters when he does. She thinks of her son - the one she now has to raise alone - and realizes there isn't enough glue in the world for all the pieces.

His family orders the body shipped home to Croatia for burial, so there's just a small service at Ike Ryan's. She thinks about how expensive babies are and how tight money is and how many hours of her residency she still has to go, and tries to decide if it makes her a bad person to cry for herself instead of him.

She wonders if it's a bad sign that she doesn't care if it does.

Hope arranges for a priest to come and say a few words. He talks about Luka's family, his friends, his dead wife and his children. All of three of them. When he gets to her, though, he doesn't know what to say because he doesn't know what she is to him - and she can't help him because she's been asking herself the same question.

She's not his widow. He asked her twice, but she didn't like the way he did it. Besides, she tried marriage once and she doesn't intend to go down that road again. The drive made her carsick.

She's not the love of his life. That title belongs to a dead woman half a world away, she knows, because if it had belonged to _her_, he would have told her that there was a crazy man threatening their family. Her _son_. The only child she'll ever have, the one Curtis Ames nearly took from her. The one who's going to grow up one day and ask where his father is. The one she won't know how to answer.

The priest finally decides on 'mother of his child'. It makes her sound more important than she feels, so she'll take it. But it's not much of a distinction. The same dead woman half a world away that's the love of his life? _She_ was the mother of his child - _children_ - too.

First.

The service ends with the standard blessing and an announcement that there will be food and drink, and everyone is invited to partake and toast his memory. They do, and after three hours of accepting condolences from people she doesn't know and doesn't want to, she can't stand it anymore.

Morris is entertaining Joe and doesn't mind keeping him for a while, so she excuses herself and flees out into the cool Chicago night. She sucks in lungfuls of frigid air and tries to figure out what the hell she's supposed to do now.

"Abigail?"

She turns, startled, and nearly twists her ankle in the heels she's wearing. She doesn't realize she has company. He steadies her, but he's not exactly all that steady himself. He's looking down at her with an expression she remembers too well, and she can almost feel the rain from that night pelting her skin as she wonders how different things would've been if she'd said yes that night. But she didn't and she can't take it back.

He's leaning in to kiss her and she knows she should stop him, but doesn't. Her lips part for his tongue and she tastes alcohol. Vodka; the good stuff, not the cheap shit. And God, she wants it. Needs it. She might even need _him_, but she won't ever admit that.

She tells herself she's only kissing him back because it's not really drinking if the alcohol is in someone else's mouth. And she tells herself it doesn't matter if one of the mourners comes out and sees her sucking another man's tongue out of his mouth in the middle of the sidewalk; she's not his widow, she's not the love of his life Hell, he never even said he loved her.

But she is his whore, she remembers.

He told her so.


	2. Chapter 2

_Rating: FRM (Fan Rated suitable for Mature persons)_

_Content Warning: Character death, language, adult themes, sex_

_Spoilers: Entire Ames arc of S13, so from 13.5 - 13.14_

_Disclaimer: ER and its characters are the property of Michael Crichton, John Wells, Amblin Entertainment and Constant C Productions. No infringement intended, please don't sue, yadda yadda yadda._

_Notes: Hiking the rating on this one. :D Dubenko's POV this time. For more specific notes, see Chapter 1._

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**Chapter 2**

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The service finally ends and he heads for the bar, orders a vodka neat, and wonders what the hell he's doing here. 

He tells himself it would look bad for the Chief of Surgery to miss the wake service for the Chief of the ER; that he's only here to pay his respects.

And he would if he had any, but he doesn't.

It's why he's avoided joining the stream of mourners. He can't look her in the eyes and tell her he's sorry for her loss when he isn't, so he stays where he is and spends the evening watching her through the bottom of his vodka glass.

Several rounds later, he sees her slip outside and before he can even ask himself what the hell he's doing, he follows.

She's sucking in huge gulps of air when he catches up to her, looking like she's about to hyperventilate, and he realizes - allows himself to admit - that _this_ is why he's here.

"Abigail?"

She turns at the sound of his voice - startled - and teeters in her high heels. He rushes forward the last couple feet to steady her before she falls, but he's not exactly steady himself; the vodka's starting to catch up to him and he nearly sends them both to the ground.

They clutch reflexively at each other, just barely managing to stay upright, and as his gaze drifts down to her face he finds himself unable to look away.

He doesn't know who the Abby Lockhart in front of him _is_, but he knows that she _isn't_ the Abby Lockhart he lost to a man who never deserved her.

And maybe that's why he kisses her.

Or maybe he's just a masochistic freak, because he knows this can't end well - it'll only hurt worse than it already does - but he can't stop himself; he doesn't want to.

And judging from the way she's wrapping her arms around him and thrusting her tongue against his lips - hard and insistent and oh _god_, so hot - neither does she.

He knows they should stop. She's just buried her child's father and he's taking advantage. She doesn't need him complicating things and emotions that are probably already complicated enough. He opens his mouth to try to tell her, but he doesn't get the chance because her tongue's inside; sucking, exploring, dueling and dominating, and he knows he won't say a word.

He doesn't have to.

His body does the talking for him.

He doesn't even have time to be embarrassed. She breaks the kiss, but doesn't pull away, and there's no mistaking the look in her eyes as she slips her hands between them, teasing along the waistband of his pants and lower, rubbing against the growing bulge.

His breath catches in his chest and he thinks he might die right there on the sidewalk when she leans in and murmurs against his ear.

"That's quite a 'probe' you've got there." He gasps as her hand cups him through his pants, squeezing for effect. She gets it in the quickening of his breath and the tightening of his crotch beneath her fingers. "And I hear I'm supposed to leave the 'deep probing' to the surgeons, so whaddya say? You wanna 'probe' me?"

It's difficult to swallow and he has to check for a moment to see if his tongue is still there. "I - um - that is t-to say, I -"

Jesus Christ.

Between the vodka and her hand, alternating between cupping and stroking him, he can barely think straight. "Here?" he croaks. "Now?"

She glances around and seems to remember that they're still on the sidewalk, in full view of the bar's front window and the mourners gathered beyond. Fortunately, no one's looking; they're all too busy getting drunk on their late Chief's dime.

A fitting tribute, he thinks, for a man who had everything and pissed it all away.

"Not here," she finally replies, and walks backwards, tugging him down a side alley. "And yes, right now."

She's on him as soon as they're out of the glow of the street lamps, pushing at his suit jacket, loosening his tie, unbuttoning his shirt - nipping and sucking at any exposed skin she can reach. It tingles and burns with the combination of the frigid night air and her hot tongue, and he gasps out something he hopes sounds like her name - which is apparently now 'Oh _god_, Abigail, I- _yes_' - as she works his erection free from his trousers and wraps her hand around it.

"Abby," she corrects him sternly, pumping her fist along his length for emphasis.

He groans and manages to moan it back to her in reply as she props one foot on an empty crate to her side, then catches one of his hands in her free one and positions it under the modest black skirt that covers the tops of her bare thighs. He looks down at her, watching him through hooded brown eyes, and doesn't even pretend not to know what she wants.

His fingers feel out the contours of her body, committing each one to memory as he slips his free hand under her shirt to cup a full breast. She moans and sucks in a sharp breath when he shifts the crotch of her panties aside to thrust two fingers inside her.

Her chest is heaving erratically under the hand that's still teasing her breast - a mirror of his own breathing - while the nimble fingers of the other tease her relentlessly, keeping pace with her fist as it moves along his length.

She's close, begging him in ragged breaths for release.

"Lu-"

He tenses, waiting for the inevitable, and promises himself he won't hate her when she calls a name he doesn't answer to.

"-cien, _please_. I can't -"

He's unprepared and bucks in her hand. And he can't deny her; he's toeing the line himself.

His fingers cease their movements as his hands find purchase on her hips - hiking her skirt up out of the way - and she's lighter than he imagined when he lifts her up and positions her above him, bracing her back against the wall.

Brown eyes lock with hazel as her mouth hovers over his, murmuring words that raise the hackles on the back of his neck in anticipation. "I'm ready for my 'internal exam'," she whispers against his lips, "and no anesthesia. I wanna feel _everything_."

Then she opens her mouth and body to him and he forgets everything but the way it feels and sounds and tastes to be the name on her lips as she comes apart around him.

Later, as he stands at the curb to hail a cab - after they've straightened their clothes and put themselves back together - he thinks about how ironic it is that he went into this hating Kovac and came out of it hating himself.

It might be funny if it weren't so pathetic.

Because he knows that given the chance to make tonight's choices again, he wouldn't change a thing. And given the chance to do it _again_...

He won't say no.


End file.
